


it's always darkest before the dawn

by JuniorWoofles



Series: the sky opened up and down poured the pain - 4.22 Codas [4]
Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Canon compliant up to the end of season 4 but will be innacurate as soon as season 5 airs, F/M, Here's hoping season 5 is less angsty than all the fic for it, Hopeful Ending, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Post-Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-19
Updated: 2017-09-19
Packaged: 2018-12-31 15:00:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12135000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JuniorWoofles/pseuds/JuniorWoofles
Summary: It was raining when Amy heard the news.





	it's always darkest before the dawn

**Author's Note:**

> This one features a little less angst and a little more hopefulness. It can still be read as a stand alone even though there is reference to the previous part of the series. 
> 
> Title from Florence + the Machine

It was raining when Amy heard the news. She'd been sent home, again. Holt said she needed to stop overworking herself what with the preparation for becoming a sergeant, her normal work and then worrying constantly about Jake on top of that. They knew prison was worse than Florida so they didn’t begrudge her worrying until it really started to affect her.

They all remembered what she'd been like on some of those Florida days.

As soon as her shift was over Holt had told her to pack up and go home in a voice that brokered no argument.

So that's how Amy came to be on her bed in one of Jake's hoodies pouring over her notes when her phone rang.

She didn't have time to say anything when she picked up before Holt’s voice came through the receiver: “We have our in.”

Her breath stuttered and died in her throat and her phone almost fell from her fingers until Holt’s gentle voice sounding so far away reminded her that she was still on the line.

“Yes, sir. I understand. Do you need me to come in?”

“We're meeting at the house of Gerald Jimes at 6 am.”

“I'll be there, sir.”

“As you were, Santiago.” There was a beat and then, “We're bringing them home.”

The call disconnected after that but Amy barely heard it. _Home,_ was the last thing she heard, the word on a loop round her head, settling into a murmur of comfort. They could do it now. They _were_ going to do it now.

They could go and hand in all the evidence they'd collected and hope it all worked out. There was a very slim chance they'd make things worse.

There was a slimmer chance it would work at all. But if it did work it would work spectacularly. There just wasn't the guarantee they all needed.

It was now or never though. They had a margin, a tiny chance when they could submit all they'd found and hopefully stun Hawkins enough that she couldn't retaliate.

(If she did retaliate they didn't know what the worst she could do to them now was. Short of framing another one of them and putting more good cops in prison she couldn't hurt them anymore. Not with Jake and Rosa gone.

(Besides, Holt didn't think she'd go that low. It would look too suspicious and they knew how to flip it in their favour if that did happen)).

If Jake and Rosa didn't come home now they didn't think they'd be able to get  more evidence to get them home earlier. Even if they both made parole (and that was doubtful) it would be years before they were released and then they wouldn't be able to come back to work. They'd have to get new jobs and go about it that way and with a “criminal history” on their records it was highly likely that they wouldn't have much of a life even if they did get out.

So the rest of them had to do this right. They had to put this right so that the 99 could go back to how it was meant to be. A family unit, with no more replacements or empty chairs.

And it was within touching distance.

Amy couldn't sleep that night. She didn't know how she was meant to. The scared excitement she was feeling was making her restless and giving her more energy than a double espresso shot.

Amy cleaned. She did that nowadays. Now that she didn't have Jake holding her close until she fell back asleep. Now she didn't have Jake kissing behind her ear and telling her dumb stories until she drifted off; now she had an empty bed that she didn't like sleeping in. Now she barely slept.

(The 99 noticed. Of course they noticed. They tried to help her in their own ways, offering couches or alcohol and sometimes she took them up on it. The rest of the time she wandered around her own apartment and avoided the bedroom like the plague and cleaned until it was time to get ready for work or until she crashed on her sofa).

Now there was a possibility that _Jake was coming home._ And that was worth a minimum of a three hours cleaning.

That's not to say that their apartment was messy and needed so much vigorous cleaning. Even when Jake lived there he took care to keep it tidy and clean in a way that he'd never done for anything else in his life. Amy loved him a little more for that. It was just that when Amy was stressed her OCD got a little out of control and every little thing had to be perfect. The cooker she'd scrubbed to death last week needed cleaned again. Her fridge needed washed out. All of the shelves had to be checked for dust. The cushions all had to be plumped. Regardless of when the last time that anything had been cleaned was, Amy was methodical in her obsessive madness. Moving from one room to the next, doing tasks in a set order every time. Practically timing herself just to see if she thought she was faster one week from the next.

It was a stress she couldn't get rid by plaiting and re-plaiting her hair or chewing on the ends of pencils until they split. It was a much deeper stress that required much more vigorous actions.

(The last time she got this stressed _before_ she'd ran away until Jake found her. Now she didn't exactly have that option so she found other ways to deal. She had to. If she got stressed and ran away from it every time she'd be as well moving to Canada. And her dad and Jake's mom and Charles would never let her leave. (Charles probably would but he'd demand he come with her and he'd drag his family with him. Then it would be Amy and the Boyles and she really needed Jake as a buffer in that scenario so that was out of the question)).

Amy went through her routine in her usual way, in the usual order. But she must have done something wrong because she'd done as much as she could: the kitchen drying off, ornaments all in their rightful positions, bed sheets in the laundry: but she had time and energy left to burn. She put the kettle on and fished out all of the birthday and Christmas cards she needed to do. She got as far as the signature on the first one (a birthday card for Gina. Amy was pretty sure Gina hadn't told her a fake date as Gina would want people to know when her birthday was) before she realised she didn't know what to put as the signature. She could just sign it as Amy and leave it at that but she knew Jake forgot about cards sometimes. Would he want her to sign for him? Or was that awfully depressing and implied she thought he wouldn't get out in time for _x_ or _y_ or _z_? Eventually, once the screech of the kettle pulled her out of her reverie, she signed it as Amy, with plenty of room for Jake to add his own message, got up to make coffee and settled down to clear the pile as best as she could.

At some point when her hand started cramping up she pushed the remaining pile away and started at the pile she'd created and felt an odd mix of anguish, guilt and sorrow. She stared at a bright pink card for Cagney and hated every word she'd written on all of the dumb cards. For a second she was tempted to burn them all but then she remembered that she was in a Not Good state and shouldn't be burning things. She didn't want to add dealing with the fire department to her list of problems.

Instead she swept them all back into her card box and threw the lid on top of it so she didn't have to stare at them any more. She stretched out her shoulders and her hand before she got up to refill her cup. She went to put the box back where it belonged before she collected her cup and went to sit by her window.

It wasn't quite dawn but it was close. One day she was going to get Jake to wake up early for it, or to stay awake all night so they could watch it. She thought he would like it, the colours bouncing off his city as it woke up. Dawn was a time of optimism and beginnings. All Amy seemed to have now we're not-quite endings and a lack of hope. She hadn't watched the sun come up in months. Sure she'd been awake for it but she didn't want to see it. It reminded her of promises and belief and waking up in the morning with Jake right by her.

Today felt like a new beginning and she wanted the sunrise to fuel her with the kind of hope she needed for today.

It was going to be a slow process. It wasn't like they'd be coming home today. But watching the sunrise it felt like it could be.

**Author's Note:**

> All kudos/comments are grately appeciated. I was blown away by the support for the last part, so thank you to anyone still reading. There's one part left in this series that I'll post in two days.


End file.
